DESCRIBE in Riak TS

You can use the DESCRIBE statement to obtain the definition of your Riak TS table. This document will show you how to execute DESCRIBE in TS.

The DESCRIBE statement returns the table’s information in rows and columns.

For example:

DESCRIBE GeoCheckin

Returns:

Column      | Type      | Is Null | Partition Key | Local Key | Interval | Unit
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
region      | varchar   | false   | 1             | 1         |          |
state       | varchar   | false   | 2             | 2         |          |
time        | timestamp | false   | 3             | 3         | 15       | m
weather     | varchar   | false   | <null>        | <null>    |          |
temperature | double    | true    | <null>        | <null>    |          |

You can use DESCRIBE in riak shell:

riak-shell>describe GeoCheckin;
+-----------+---------+-------+-----------+---------+--------+----+
|  Column   |  Type   |Is Null|Primary Key|Local Key|Interval|Unit|
+-----------+---------+-------+-----------+---------+--------+----+
|  region   | varchar | false |     1     |    1    |        |    |
|   state   | varchar | false |     2     |    2    |        |    |
|   time    |timestamp| false |     3     |    3    |   15   | m  |
|  weather  | varchar | false |           |         |        |    |
|temperature| double  | true  |           |         |        |    |
+-----------+---------+-------+-----------+---------+--------+----+

Using TS’s supported clients, a successful DESCRIBE will return a language-specific representation of the table.

  • Java - Use a Query command to execute a DESCRIBE statement.
  • Ruby - Use the Riak::TimeSeries::Query object to execute the DESCRIBE statement. The returned results will have a collection of rows as well as a columns property corresponding to the above table.
  • Python - either the ts_query or ts_describe methods of the client object can be used to executed a DESCRIBE statement. In both cases, the response object will have columns and rows properties corresponding to the above table.
  • C# - Use a Query command to execute a DESCRIBE statement.
  • Node.js - you may use the TS.Query command to execute a DESCRIBE statement, or use the purpose-built TS.Describe command. In both cases, the response object will have columns and rows properties corresponding to the above table.